Maybe not, but maybe.
It’s been a long, but incredibly slow offseason in the NBA, and there’s still a lot of time left for it to keep being long and slow. It’s been so long and slow, in fact, that we’re still less than a month removed from a report that the Golden State Warriors were “aggressively” shopping All-Star wing Andrew Wiggins.
Since that report, things have gotten quiet. We really haven’t heard any peeps surrounding Wiggins, save for a little drama about him playing (or rather, not playing) for Canada in the Olympics, which seems have blown over (at least publicly). So it’s fair to wonder whether the team is still shopping Wiggins aggressively ... or even shopping him at all.
Things certainly change, and two things in particular could have moved the Warriors away from shopping Wiggins. First and most importantly, they might have been humbled a bit — or at least splashed with some Tahoe-cold water — upon finding out Wiggins’ market, or lack thereof. And second, after seeing Klay Thompson opt to leave in free agency, and not picking up Chris Paul’s contract, the Warriors might be a little less desperate to shed salary ahead of the 2024-25 NBA season.
But the Dubs also might simple be exercising patience with Wiggins, and hoping that a team will get more desperate as the season inches closer. And with Paul and Thompson gone, Wiggins is the only large chunk of salary that the Warriors could move in a deal, meaning Wiggins is almost guaranteed to be involved in a trade should the Warriors find a way to swing a big move. Lauri Markkanen, it’s worth noting, is only owed $18 million for the upcoming season, so the Warriors could trade for him without including Wiggins. But if they were to acquire, say, Brandon Ingram — owed $36 million — it would almost certainly include Two Way Wiggs.
It’s worth wondering if the team’s offseason moves signal anything. De’Anthony Melton and Kyle Anderson, while certainly different players than Wiggins, fit his mold fairly well: strong and versatile defensive players who can fit into an offensive framework, while Buddy Hield fills much of the offensive profile. And of course, if Moses Moody is ready to step into a bigger role, he plays a similar game to Wiggins, while the emergence of Trayce Jackson-Davis might make it so that Jonathan Kuminga would need to take Wiggins’ spot if he wants to stay in the starting lineup. Then again, “too many versatile wings” is not a problem any modern NBA GM has ever had.
If I had to guess, I’d say the Warriors are no longer aggressively shopping Wiggins, but given how much money he’s owed, how much he fell off last year, and how many pieces they have who could potentially replicate his role and production, I’d assume they’re still putting out feelers.
